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Turkeys Sleep In

Even though I am an accountant by profession, I'm not very good at remembering numbers. I guess I see so many of those little digits that they start to look the same after a while. How else would you explain my thinking the Syracuse Turkey Trot started at 7:30 AM. I was a full hour and a half early! My 5 year old son and I opted to do the one mile walk as his first introduction to recreational racing and we headed out the door at 7:20 AM. I was surprised by his excitement and willingness to pop out of bed on a cold Saturday morning. When I told him that we were too early after I talked to the race organizers who were setting up the timing clock and finish line banners, he suggested we just wait in the car. We live less then three minutes away so that wasn't an appealing option to me. I thought about heading to McDonald's but figured mom would start to worry if it took us 2 hours to do a one mile walk. So we went back to the house and waited. By the time 8:30 rolled around my 2 year old had also gotten out of bed and wanted to race too. The three of us left at 8:35 even though registration closed at 8:45. Race time was 9:00. In my mind, that was plenty of time but I forget how long 2 and 5 year olds take to do ANYTHING.At the race, I was surprised at the bureaucracy in registration for a free race. There were 6 different divisions with corresponding lines for each . Since I was in a different division than my two boys, I had to stand in two different lines. Even though I was the only one in ANY line at the time. It reminded me of the scene in Meet The Parents where Ben Stiller had to wait for his row to be called for seating on an airplane that was completely empty. Turns out, the registration process would be the fastest part of the whole event. Once we got our race numbers, I asked a guy to take our picture to commemorate or first father-son race. Too cool!

After the starting siren, it was a fight for the sidewalk. The family behind...er...in front...wait... behind again kept changing their mind on whether or not to ride in, around or behind the stroller. My kids didn't help any by dropping gloves, sprinting then stopping and other spastic moves. We finally settled into a slow and comfortable last place and walked the remaining 7/8ths of a mile to the finish. Final time 22 minutes 32 seconds. A family record!